# EXIF Inspector & Cleaner

> See all photo metadata (EXIF, GPS, XMP, IPTC, MakerNotes) and download a cleaned copy. Lists every metadata tag in a photo, grouped into EXIF, GPS, XMP, IPTC, MakerNotes and colour profile, and warns when the picture reveals where it was taken. Creates a cleaned copy without re-compressing the image: remove everything, only the GPS location, or everything except orientation and colour profile, then checks the cleaned file to prove it.

Part of usefulweb.site (https://usefulweb.site/). Results are deterministic calculations from the inputs and the listed assumptions; the API returns exactly what the web page shows.

## Use it
- Human interface: https://exifinspectorcleaner.usefulweb.site/ (interactive tool at https://exifinspectorcleaner.usefulweb.site/tool)
- JSON API: POST https://exifinspectorcleaner.usefulweb.site/api/v1/calculate with a JSON object of inputs (schema: https://exifinspectorcleaner.usefulweb.site/api/v1/tool)
- OpenAPI: https://exifinspectorcleaner.usefulweb.site/openapi.json
- MCP (Streamable HTTP): https://exifinspectorcleaner.usefulweb.site/mcp - tool `exif_inspector_cleaner`

## Inputs
- file (file, required): Photo - JPG, PNG, WebP, TIFF, HEIC, AVIF or GIF (RAW files can be inspected but not cleaned), max 50 MB.
- action (select): What to do

## Method
- exiftool reads every metadata block (-a -G0:1). Tags are grouped by where they live: EXIF (IFD0/ExifIFD), GPS (the GPS IFD plus XMP GPS tags), XMP, IPTC, MakerNotes (manufacturer data such as serial numbers), the ICC colour profile and file structure. Server-side file system entries (temporary names, dates) are not shown.
- GPS coordinates are shown as decimal degrees so you can see what others could see. No map service is contacted.
- Cleaning edits the metadata only; the compressed image data is copied unchanged (no re-encoding, no quality loss). "Remove all" deletes every writable tag (including the colour profile); "Only GPS" deletes the GPS IFD and all GPS* tags; "Keep orientation and colour profile" deletes everything, then copies back Orientation and the colour-space tags (ICC profile, ColorSpace).
- Verification re-reads the cleaned file with exiftool and counts remaining tags per group; for JPG, PNG, WebP, GIF and TIFF ImageMagick also compares a hash of the decoded pixels before and after.
- RAW files are inspect-only: deleting their metadata can make them undecodable.

## Limits
- Metadata is only one way photos leak information: faces, street signs and reflections in the picture itself are not removed.